While the Eastern Church sees Christ as the One Who gave His life as a ransom for many, it sees it in a different way that the Western Church. St. Athanasius the Great states that Christ is the ransom that was paid to death. Taking Hosea 13:14 into consideration, Athanasius states that “the ransom was offered to death on behalf of all so that by it He once more opened the way to the heavens.” In stark contrast, the Anselmian doctrine asserts that the debt was paid to God the Father to satisfy His infinite wrath, a byproduct of offense to His justice and honor. This doctrine of Atonement also states that sin is an affront to the Divinity, for which mere man cannot make reparation; it regards sin as a transgression in the legal sense rather than the Eastern perspective of an illness of the heart and will. In this light, Anselm’s assumption is that a “divine honor” has been wounded and is in need of “satisfaction.” This necessitates a legal transaction by which Christ pays the Father with His own blood the debt incurred by man’s sin. The Resurrection of Christ does not occupy a central place in man’s redemption.

If God then is infinitely offended by our sin and is therefore in need of some infinite “satisfaction,” many can rightly (unfortunately) begin to equate this God with a sadistic image of a father compelled by honor to inflict punishment. Thus God is made subject to justice. By subjecting God to this law of necessity and ascribing to Him human characteristics such as vengeance and anger, we make it appear that it is God who is in need of healing, and not man. [Is man so powerful that he can, in any way, so grievously offend an infinite God that that God demands some sort of satisfaction? This approach seems to have been heavily influenced by the kings of the Western world in olden days.

However, God never changes, for it is not God that is at enmity with man; but man who is at enmity with God. The foundation of a proper understanding of salvation is that God does not change: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). Thus the Eastern approach seeks to heal man, and not God, recognizing sin as a refusal of the Love of God, the entrance of death, and, of course, the deconstruction of the soul.

It is important that we reflect upon how we truly understand the actions of Jesus, our Savior.